What technology is right for my organisation?

Posted on 14th November 2016 at 14:21

This is the age old question organisations ask themselves as they develop and grow. There is so much out there such as Cloud Solutions, Internet of Things (IOT), Big data, VOIP Phones etc. etc. so what should you be considering out of all that’s available.

This is the age old question organisations ask themselves as they develop and grow.

There is so much out there such as Cloud Solutions, Internet of Things (IOT), Big data, VOIP Phones etc. etc. so what should you be considering out of all that’s available.

Before you ask yourself that question you should ask yourself another: – “What is the problem I am trying to solve?”

Implementing technology, whether it is application software or hardware, can be a lot of expense so you need to know that it is going to be money well spent and that you will realise benefits from doing it.

It’s worth stating at this point – Technology will not fix bad processes, it will only compound the issues!

If you ask yourself the question and believe the problems are the processes you have in place then technology isn’t going to solve that. The best course of action is to take a step back and complete a review of what you do and how you do it. You can then look at making them more efficient and determine how technology can help.

Below are three areas that would be worth taking the time to think about and see if any are applicable to you.

Communication

One area that always causes problems is communication in a remote workforce. By that I mean if you have steadily grown your business and embedded a culture of remote working whether that may be allowing staff to work at home or you have a diverse sales force spread all around the country, effective communication is key to ensure the smooth running of the operation.

There are a number of tools out in the market place for businesses that can certainly help you and make the resources more productive and engaged. Such tools as Slack or Yammer can be used alongside emails to be more engaging and interactive. How many emails have you seen that have pages and pages of responses and you think to yourself ‘What was the original purpose of the email and has it been answered?’

Collaboration

Another area that is worth looking at in a small or growing business is knowledge share and filing of key information such as company policies, newsletters in a central, easily accessible and searchable platform. Even in a small company, there is a staggering amount of knowledge kept in individuals heads so to minimise your risks if the individuals were to leave or be off long term create a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) and file it on the company Intranet.

Again there several solutions out there such as Hyperoffice, Interact or Papyrs that can be introduced to allow a centralised view of the organisation where employees know they can go and find out information.

File sharing and secure storage

Organisations need a way that lets them do more than simply attach a document to an email and this is where the file sharing platforms work so well. They let you securely and easily share nearly any file type to multiple people without using up all your email storage.

These file sharing services are built with security in mind which is very relevant in this current age of data being lost or stolen. They can be setup easily to control access to sensitive data on a per-user or per-file basis while carefully monitoring when the most recent changes were made to specific documents for true version control.

Most of the solutions out in the market you will have heard of such as Dropbox, Google Drive and Microsoft Onedrive. When these are set up correctly they can help mitigate a number of risks around version control and security.

Understanding what is out there can be daunting and the above is just the tip of the technology iceberg so having an independent view on what is right for you is key to ensuring success.

As mentioned at the very start of the article its not just about implementing the right technology but understanding what the problems you are trying to address first and then look at where the technology can help out.

For smaller organisations it is not possible, or cost effective, to have a full-time IT Director as part of the senior management team to help them navigate through the technology sea. This is where the Virtual IT Director service from Green Giant Consulting Ltd can help.

Green Giant’s Virtual IT Director service provides an experienced, impartial IT strategist to ensure your business IT requirements are fully met in the most practical and cost effective way. All this is achieved for an agreed amount of time for as long you want, minimising the risk to you.

Contact Green Giant Consulting today on 01159 648 218 or visit www.greengiantconsulting.co.uk to book your free initial consultation to help you determine which is the right technology for you. Giant Consulting Ltd is part of the Business Support Alliance that can offer help and support for any area of your business.